The Touch Of A Killer
by BornInTartarus
Summary: After Adrian captures Oliver, he believes that even slightly touching anyone he loves will mark them for death. unable to cope with hurting one of his loved ones, Oliver hides away, refusing to get treatment. will he slowly whither away, or will Felicity and John find a way to help him?


_Oliver's POV_

How his head hurt. What had he gotten himself into this time? Where was Felicity and Diggle?

It took him awhile to get his eyes to open. His vision was swimming. Grunting, he tried in vain to blink his dried blood out of his eyes. Touching his head, he gingerly felt dried blood there too.

He groaned as he stood up, swaying dizzily. It took him a minute to regain his breath and blink the spots out of his eyes.

What he saw when he raised his head almost made him fall back to the ground.

Quintin was gasping as he pressed his hands over multiple fatal arrow wounds. His face twisted in pain and he started to choke as blood poured out of his mouth. Oliver ran to help him, but Quintin just turned away.

"You? You want to _help_ me?" He almost smiled, which was even worse. His teeth were stained red from his own blood, and he was practically sobbing as he tried to get the words out.

"You betrayed me, Oliver. Prometheus was right! You're a monster, one that enjoys killing!"

Oliver was the one crying now. He backed away, covering his ears from the terrible words. Quintin started to advance on him, staggering. He spread his hands. "You did this to me! All of it. I'm dying because of _you_."

Oliver fell to the ground, shaking. Quintin stared at him hatefully. He felt like throwing up when he saw that the arrows in Quintin's body were green- his. " _I thought of you as my son!"_

Oliver flattened himself on the ground, trembling hysterically. He covered his eyes. He didn't know how long he stayed like that. When he raised his head off the floor again, bewilderment lined his face.

Quintin was gone. So was the blood. He could have sworn he was sitting on the floor of the bunker a few minutes ago. But instead, he was lying on a dirty cold floor, plain concrete.

He got up, rubbing his eyes. He swayed like a drunk man, grabbing onto something hanging from the ceiling. Taking them into his hands, he realized they were handcuffs.

He was also pretty sure it was _his_ blood covering them.

Finally able to stand, he took in his surroundings. He was standing in a small dark room. There were handcuffs hanging from the ceiling, and his arrows and good were lying on the floor by his feet.

He stared at the arrows, nausea making his stomach churn. Suddenly and unexpectedly, he turned around and fell onto his knees, retching. The smell was awful but he couldn't stop until he brought everything up. In a matter of minutes, he was throwing up nothing but blood. It was only a couple heaves, but his chest was burning when he finished.

He wiped his mouth weakly. He knew he had to get away, or someone would find him. He reached his hand to grab his hood, but his hand started shaking when he tried to pick up the green arrows.

 _This is stupid,_ He told himself

But he still couldn't bring himself to hold them, so he left with the green hood bunched under his arm, hiding it. There was no reason to hide it, however. Adrian had taken him far from the heart of Star City. He recognized the outskirts and knew where he was.

Yeah, he remembered now. He was captured.

He started staggering towards Star City, when he suddenly stumbled and an image of a wounded Quintin flashed through his mind. He almost fell, until his mind finally put up his mental barrier.

 _You have to get somewhere safe,_ he told himself stubbornly.

But he knew there was no way he could go back into Star City. A dead Quintin might be waiting for him. Or worse. It could be Thea, John, or Felicity.

 _Felicity._

Oh God. he wanted to see her so bad. But what if he did something to her? Adrian told him just touching a person would sentence them to death. He couldn't deal with hurting any of the people he loved.

Finally making a decision, he turned away determinedly and banished all thoughts of Felicity from his mind. Instead, he started thinking of other places he could go, places where no one could find him.

He couldn't risk hurting someone else.

Eventually, he made up his mind and started walking towards his dad's old workshop, the first "Arrow Cave".

It was empty, devoid of any trace that there had been a secret organization working there. Oliver sunk to the ground and closed his eyes in exhaustion.

 _No._ he knew doing that would be fatal. He'd die and never wake up again. But then again, would that be such a bad thing? His eternal musing couldn't answer that question.

He struggled to sit up again. He didn't have any medical supplies, but he'd have to make do right now. He crawled across the floor tiredly and ripped open an unnoticed panel on the wall. The extra emergency medical supplies had obviously not remained unscathed from the last time the police had searched the place.

There was about two bandages, a bottle of half-used ointment and one pair of rusty tweezers. The bandages were nowhere close to enough. Oliver could count at least five bad cuts on his chest, and more on his back and arms.

He ripped them in half and tried to fit them as best as he could. He used most of the ointment on his Bratva tattoo.

Or at least what was left of it.

When he was done, his mouth seemed to be permanently fixed into a grimace of pain. His breathing was getting more and more shallow every time he inhaled. He left the bloody pieces of cloth that he had used on the floor. He didn't have the energy to put them away just yet.

He bunched up his green hood and placed his head on top of it. Oh well. It wasn't the best pillow in the world,but he was so tired he probably could have passed out on a pile of rocks.

Sighing, he closed his eyes.


End file.
